“It is the place to tell me why you doubt.” His glance went to the death-bed. “Could I be false, with your father lying there?”
“You could not—no—and yet it seems so mean a thing to talk of here.”
“It divides us, and he did not want that.”
“I am ashamed either way,” she said, her brave eyes meeting his—“of you, or of myself for doubting.”
Little by little he drew the tale from her. She had come to the wood between Logie and the slope to Wharfe River, weeks ago, and seen him with Nita’s arms stretched out to him.
Hardcastle understood now all that had baffled him these late days. He recalled each detail of that half-forgotten scene—Nita’s alluring eagerness, the sharp crack of a twig, his glance backward to learn if one of the Lost Folk was stealing on him from behind.
“You saw us there,” he said, “and she was an old love of mine. What else could you have thought?”
His quietness seemed to rebuke her. All these weeks she had been the silent accuser, he the shameless culprit. Was he a liar through and through, under his mask of gruff honesty?
“We shared the woodmen’s hut for a night,” he went on, “and afterwards there was trouble. I asked to clear that for you.”
“From pity.” It was her turn now to glance at the silent figure on the settle. “We never cared for charity, he and I.”